Medial calcaneal entrapment neuropathy as a cause of heel pain : an electrophysiological study

Abstract EN

Heel pain is a common symptom of many patients and it has different etiological causes.

The existence of chronic heel pain induced by nerve compression prompted the conduction of this study.

Entrapment of the medial calcaneal nerve (MCN) can be suspected in patients with heel pain and normal electrophysiological study of the commonly affected nerves (tibial, medial plantar, lateral plantar and common peroneal).

Sensory nerve conduction for the MCN was measured in 15 patients (9 men and 6 women) with heel pain and 10 healthy volunteers (6 men and 4 women) using antidromic stimulation of the tibial nerve with surface electrodes.

Reference values (mean + 2 SD) of normal controls were determined for MCN onset latency (2.05 + 0.37 ms), peak latency (2.7 + 0.34 ms), onset conduction velocity (50.35 + 9 m/s), peak conduction velocity (37.95 + 4.84 m/s), and baseline-to-peak amplitude (19.38 + 7.2 V).

Five of the 15 patients (33.3 %) showed abnormalities in their sensory nerve conduction of the MCN.

Affection was usually in latencies and velocities but rarely in the amplitude.

This study provides an easily performed, reproducible method for electrophysiological evaluation of the MCN.